David's Astronomy Pages Notes - Session 641 (2018-12-16)

Notes (S640)

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Notes (S642)

	Session Aims & Highlights
	- Observing Result  - Night Summary Plot
	Operational Issues
	- Critical Issues (0),  Major Issues (2),  Minor Issues (7),  Continuous Improvement (0)
	Images from 2018-12-16  >>
	2018-12-17
	Dome Port Switching

Session Aims & Highlights (2018-12-16)

Main aims

1. Software. Test operation of Observatory Control Program (AstroMain)  following several recent code changes and corrections.
2. Focusing. Test corrected routines for autofocusing the TS 80mm secondary scope with Pegasus Universal Stepper Motor/ZWO camera images
3. Targets. Acquire images of a range of targets (comets, variable stars, nearby stars and deep sky objects)
4. Stability. Check overall stability of the Observatory System (hardware & software) 

Equipment & Software

• 12" LX200 and ST-10XME
• 80mm APO and ZWO ASI 178MC
• CCDApp2, TheSky6, CCDSoft5, PHD2,  POTH Hub
• Pegasus UPB & Motor Focus, TCF-S
• AstroMain 3.5.9

Highlights

•  Images.  Images from a number of targets were successfully acquired
• Focus Box Positioning is now working correctly (after earlier bug was fixed )
• ZWO Camera Snap/Locate Images, Focus Box Images and Foc2 Focus Profiles are now working

Lowlights

•   Computer crash. A computer crash at 00:40 prevented acqusition of targets after this time).

Summary Plots & Logs

Observing Result (2018-12-16, S641)

Time   Activity 17:18 Operations Started 17:22   Observatory Manager set to auto 17:25   Observing Plan built 17:25   Shutter Opened / Dome Equilbration started 17:30   Job queue started 17:33   Software Crash (Unhandled Exception - No further details 18:04   Job queue resumed 18:49   Foc1 Focusing (TCF-S) 21:16   Job stopped / Observatory Manager returned to Manual 21:17   Cam2 Testing (TS-80). 21:22   Foc2 Focusing (TS-80). 21:27.   Foc2 Focusing (TS-80) 21:43.   Foc2 Focusing (TS-80) 21:55   Observatory Manager set to auto 21:56   Job queue restarted 22:01   Software Crash  (Camera/AnalyseStarsInImage issue) 22:19   Foc1 Focusing (TCF-S) 22:29.    Dome Parked, Telescope Parked.  22:30.   Operations Ended.

Night Sky Summary Plot - 2018-12-16 Top axis: Sky Brightness at Zenith (in ADU/s) Lefthand axis: Local Time (hh LT). Righthand axis: Sun Altitude (degs) Shutter/Telescope active from ~ 22:00 to ~ 01:30

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Operational Issues (2018-12-16, S641)

• Critical Issues (0)
• Major Issues (2)
• Minor issues (7)
• Continuous Improvement (0)

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Critical Issues

• None

Major Issues

• AstroMain program crashed due to unhandled exception. Details of unhandled exception at 17:33 not recorded.
  Closed, insufficient data to take further. (Closed out Nov 2020)
   
• Dome unexpectedly switched to COM14 (rather than normnal COM9 / COM4).  This was probably because the USB cable had been placed in a different port on the USB Hub during observatory testing a couple of days earlier (2018-12-14). The workaround was to changing the secondary port settings in AstroMain Settings.
  Routine in plcae to automatically swap COM Port. (AstroMain)

Minor issues

• Session Observations not correctly saved.  Observations saved into 2018-12-08 TEST, rather than 2018-12-16  S00641
  Fixed on 2018-12-17      (issue was that 'SessionNo' wasn't getting generated when the AstroMain program was restarted)
   
• Dome Port Setting in AstroGuard.  Primary/Secondary Ports settings are hardcoded into AstrroGuard leaving no workaround to Dome's unexpected ComPort Chnage to (COM 14), apart from changed and recompiling the program and then reinstalling it on the observatory computer.  Need to make AstroGuards settings user changeable and not hard-coded)
  Fixed on 2018-12-17 (fixed by the introduction a settings tab and a settings.dat file)
   
• Focus Profile, Inner and Outer Focus Lines. Foc1 profile is failing to generate inner and outer lines describing the HFD profile. Report produces the messages "not enough points to define line" even though there seems to be enough data.
  Closed as HFD Focusing has been abandoned (Closed out Nov 2020)
   
• Non-sidereal ToO Targets.    Whilst attempting to insert a comet as a Target Of Opportunity (ToO) from AstroPlan, an error message was given saying that the target was below the horizon and couldn't be sent to the Queue.   This happened as the target Az/Alt was checked using the RA/Dec saved in the Target's  database record when it was created, rather than finding the comets current location.    Need to either access the current Ra/Dec or allow Non-Sidereal targets to pass the check unhindered.  Probably best to get updated Ra/Dec coords for active non-sidereal targets and save them in the Targets table as part of Autobuild Plan.
  Fixed on 2018-12-17    (by providing an "Update RaDec Coords" button on Submit Target of Opportunity form)
   
• Autofocusing Range for Foc2 (TS80) need to be much narrower for finding best focus or made as a two stage process.
  Resolved 2020 with introduction of precursive wide focus search before standard (narrower) focus search
   
• Setting 'Meade LX200GPS' as the POTH.Scope using code is not working on the observatory computer. The 'Meade LX200GPS/R" setting has be manually chosen.
  Fixed on 2018-12-17     (issue was caused by an error in telescope ID used)
   
• Restarting CCDSoft as part of creating a New Session automatically connects to SBIG Camera after CCDSoft has restarted.   Camera connection should be made to only happen if bCameraConnected paramter is true, otherwise the camera should not be connected upon restart.
  Fixed on 2018-12-17

Continuous Improvement - None

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2018-12-17

Dome Port Switching

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